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Young Adult Books You Want to Read

As you may or may not know, our company, The Book Report Network, has a number of websites about books and authors in addition to Bookreporter.com. Throughout the year, Bookreporter.com features adult books on Teenreads.com, our site for young adult readers, that we think will have definite appeal to a teen audience. In the spirit of sharing, we are now spotlighting a selection of titles each month from Teenreads.com that we believe are great reads that you might enjoy.

Imogen is a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook and a cheat. Jule is a fighter, a social chameleon and an athlete. An intense friendship. A disappearance. A murder, or maybe two. A bad romance, or maybe three. Blunt objects, disguises, blood and chocolate. The American dream, superheroes, spies and villains. A girl who refuses to give people what they want from her. A girl who refuses to be the person she once was.

Four months ago, Sara Zapata's best friend disappeared, kidnapped by the web of criminals who terrorize Juarez.. Four hours ago, Sara received a death threat --- and with it, a clue to the place where her friend is locked away. Four weeks ago, Emiliano Zapata fell in love with Perla Rubi, who will never be his so long as he's poor. Four minutes ago, Emiliano got the chance to make more money than he ever dreamed --- just by joining the web. In the next four days, Sara and Emiliano will each face impossible choices. But when the web closes in on Sara, only one path remains for the siblings: the way across the desert to the United States.

Six months ago, Griffin Sawyer meant to steal a car, but he never meant to steal the girl asleep in the backseat. Panicked, he took her home. His father, Roy, decided to hold Cheyenne --- who is blind --- for ransom. Griffin helped her escape, and now Roy is awaiting trial. As they prepare to testify, Griffin and Cheyenne reconnect and make plans to meet. But the plan goes wrong and Cheyenne gets captured by Roy’s henchmen --- this time for the kill. Can Cheyenne free herself? And is Griffin a pawn or a player in this deadly chase?

SOLDIER BOY begins with the story of Ricky Richard Anywar, abducted at age 14 in 1989 to fight with Joseph Kony's rebel army in Uganda’s decades-long civil war. Ricky is trained, armed and forced to fight government soldiers alongside his brutal kidnappers, but never stops dreaming of escape. The story continues 20 years later, with a fictionalized character named Samuel, representative of the thousands of child soldiers Ricky eventually helped rehabilitate as founder of the internationally acclaimed charity Friends of Orphans.

Sandra Uwiringiyimana was just 10 years old when she found herself with a gun pointed at her head. She had watched as rebels gunned down her mother and six-year-old sister in a refugee camp. Remarkably, the rebel didn’t pull the trigger, and Sandra escaped. Thus began a new life for her and her surviving family members. With no home and no money, they struggled to stay alive. Eventually, through a United Nations refugee program, they moved to America, only to face yet another ethnic disconnect. In this memoir, Sandra tells the story of her survival, of finding her place in a new country, of her hope for the future, and how she found a way to give voice to her people.

It's 1999 in Bolivia, and Francisco's life consists of school, soccer, and trying to find space for himself in his family's cramped yet boisterous home. But when his father is arrested on false charges and sent to prison by a corrupt system that targets the uneducated, the poor and the indigenous majority, Francisco and his sister are left with no choice: They must move into prison with their father. There, they find a world unlike anything they've ever known, where everything has its price. With their lives upended, Francisco faces an impossible decision: break up the family and take his sister to their grandparents in the Andean highlands, or remain together in the increasingly dangerous prison.

Seventeen-year-old Nora Holmes is an artist, a painter from the moment she could hold a brush. She inherited the skill from her grandfather, Robert, who's always nurtured her talent and encouraged her to follow her passion. Still, Nora is shocked and elated when Robert offers her a gift: an all-expenses-paid summer trip to Europe to immerse herself in the craft and to study history's most famous artists. The only catch? Nora has to create an original piece of artwork at every stop and send it back to her grandfather. Unfortunately, Nora's mother, Alice, is less than thrilled about the trip. But seconds after saying goodbye to Alice at the airport terminal, Nora hears a voice call out: "Wait! Stop! I'm coming with you!"

By turns hysterically funny and heartbreakingly poignant, BuzzFeed senior writer Erin Chack recounts everything from meeting her soulmate at age 14 to her first chemotherapy session at age 19 to what really goes on behind the scenes at a major Internet media company. She authentically captures the agony and the ecstasy of the millennial experience, whether it's her first kiss or her struggles with anxiety. Yet Erin also offers a fresh perspective on universal themes of resilience and love as she writes about surviving cancer --- including learning of her mother's own cancer diagnosis within the same year and her attempts to hide the diagnosis from friends to avoid "un-normaling" everything.

Juan Pablo lives in El Rosario, Mexico’s butterfly sanctuary, where millions of winged creatures gather together in one magical place. He loves his music, the butterflies, and his grandmother, who has fallen fatally ill --- which is why he can’t leave, even when a nefarious drug cartel overtakes the town. But the threat of the cartel becomes ever more menacing, finally endangering the life of his best friend Rocio, the girl he loves. In a heroic act of desperation to save her, Juan Pablo poisons eight members of the cartel. Together, Juan Pablo and Rocio flee, following the instructions his grandmother gave before she passed away: Follow the migration of the butterflies, where someone will be waiting for you.

Sebastian Cody did something horrible, something no one --- not even Sebastian himself --- can forgive. At the age of four, he accidentally shot and killed his infant sister with his father's gun. Now, 10 years later, Sebastian has lived with the guilt and horror for his entire life. With his best friend away for the summer, Sebastian has only a new friend --- Aneesa --- to distract him from his darkest thoughts. But even this relationship cannot blunt the pain of his past. Because Sebastian knows exactly how to rectify his childhood crime and sanctify his past. It took a gun to get him into this. Now he needs a gun to get out.

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Books On Screen

September's Books on Screen roundup includes the feature films Unbroken: Path to Redemption, Bel Canto and Little Women; the series premieres of "The Miniaturist" on Amazon Prime Video and "You" on Lifetime, along with the season two finale of USA's "The Sinner"; and the DVD releases of Adrift and The Seagull.